PHILOS 1 Lecture Notes - Lecture 7: Qualia, René Descartes, Behaviorism
Document Summary
What is the relationship between the mind and the body between the mental realm (thoughts, beliefs, pains, emotions) and the physical realm (matter, atoms, neurons) Physical objects are spatial: they occupy a location in space and have a spatial dimension. The qualities of mental states are different from the qualities of physical events. Your knowledge of your own states of mind is direct and unchallengeable in a way that your knowledge of physical objects is not. You can be mistaken in believing that that"s a barn. But you cannot be mistaken in believing that you believe that that"s a barn. Representational states (propositional attitudes): they are about something and their contents are propositions. Qualitative states (qualia): many mental states are conscious, and there is some distinctive way it feels to be in that mental state. Dualism: the mind and the body are separate substances. Monism: mind are body are not separate substances.